On Cliché – Marcus Tan

“You said, ‘I love you.’ Why is it that the most unoriginal thing we can say to one another is still the
thing we long to hear?” — Written on the Body, Jeanette Winterson.

My lips form a soft oval lying on its side,
tongue travelling down from the palate, upper
teeth closing in, forming “love.”

You look at me, ears pricked as if in wait for more,
eyes darting towards my lips, pushing me.

I’m tired. There are few words left in language
that aren’t exhausting or utterly tiring. I cannot
express myself without inducing nausea, nor can
I write with a conviction that isn’t borrowed from
the wisdom of those who came before me.

Yet, I try. My lips open and tunnel down, tongue
curled to form “I.” This is a word that
represents me as much as it doesn’t at all.

Tongue arched, I mouth “love” as deliberately
as I can, mind already queasy from cliché, trying to
complete “you” in a manner that doesn’t
leave me feeling like a thief.

I wonder, then, if I love you the way Romeo loves Juliet,
or if I love you the way Odysseus loves Penelope. I wonder,
too, if both Romeo and Odysseus had borrowed their words
from Gilgamesh, and if I love you like he does Enkidu instead.

“I love you,” I say, placing in my mind the necessary quotation
marks. In the spaces between our breaths, I think only of
how I’ve nothing left to say. I have exhausted all
my words, and I haven’t a thing to say.

I don’t wait for your reply—
It’ll be as unoriginal as mine.